Oh Canada

A movie about a selfish, fictionalised, elderly, frail, ill and once-heralded documentary filmmaker (played by Richard Gere), whose docs seem to have been all but forgotten bar the aficionados, agrees to an all-day interview to recount his life and career, and which the producer pitches as a means to re-establish his credentials for a new generation.

Sadly, it's nothing more than an ego trip for Gere, perhaps hoping this film will get him an Oscar nomination, which is risible given he can't act and is the same bland baloney sandwich in everything. Uma Thurman plays his wife and supposed muse but she has so little to do and say with such a two-dimensional character, it's inexplicable why she even bothered to do this. The same can be said of Michael Imperioli's role, and all those of All the other characters - they're nothing but shadows: no depth or complexity or shine.

Worse, the ploddingly insipid-sounding songs (reminiscent of Nick Drake but with none of the talent) as scene music/ambience are as dull as the script - or rather, the "pretentious literary drivel" as the filmmaker once accurately remarks of his own pathetic, early and failed attempt at being a novelist - and the tiresome, vacuous flashback scenes all pile one atop another to hammer home the same banal point: that Gere's character is utterly selfish, feckless and incredibly dull. Why anyone of the women in his life ever wanted to sleep with him, or spend time with him, is as incomprehensible as why anybody would want to speak with such a bland blancmange of a personality.

Unless you're looking for a cure for insomnia, or a good reason to throw/shout something at your screen while watching this, save yourself six hours of your life - ok, so it's 90 mins -but it Feels like six - and do something more meaningful instead, like watch Pity (2018), the brilliant foreign film by Babis Makridis.

It's bad enough when a film disappoints and doesn't live up to expectations. But what's perhaps worse is when a picture not only fails to live up to expectations, but also validates the negative reputation that precedes it. Such is the case, regrettably, with the latest feature from filmmaker Paul Schrader, an embarrassingly bad production from an artist who has written and/or directed such masterful works as "First Reformed" (2017), "American Gigolo" (1980), "Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters" (1985), "The Last Temptation of Christ" (1988) and "Taxi Driver" (1976). This miserably unfocused slog struggles to tell the story of Leonard Fife (Richard Gere), a famous but terminally ill director who's being interviewed for a made-for-TV biography discussing his legendary life and career as a revered documentary filmmaker. However, the protagonist doesn't see this so much as a congratulatory tribute to his accomplishments but as a cathartic, unburdening confession about the life he led that virtually no one knows anything about. To complicate matters, his rapidly failing health and cloudy memory keep him from fulfilling this objective, especially when he reveals secrets about himself not known by even those closest to him (most notably, his wife, Emma (Uma Thurman), and his protégé, Malcolm (Michael Imperioli), director of the biography), revelations that they're quick to attribute to faulty recall. Leonard's previously hidden back story comes to life through a series of clumsy, disjointed flashbacks featuring his younger self (Jacob Elordi) presented in a largely unintelligible fashion that brings new meaning to the term "nonlinear." What's worse, though, is that the relevance of these admissions largely goes unexplained and unresolved, bearing seemingly little relation to the nature of his character or his career as an auteur. His flight to Canada and experience as a conscientious objector during the Vietnam War, for example, receives surprisingly little attention given that his defection from the US is essentially responsible for what made his vocation as a filmmaker possible. Then there are snippets from his many passing dalliances with women that make for a story more like "Oh! Calcutta!" than "Oh, Canada." Taken together, these elements make for a hodgepodge of moments from a life undefined, one that viewers are likely to care little about in the end. Such work is highly uncharacteristic for an artist like Schrader, which makes the impression it leaves all the more worse. Whatever the director was going for here, it's not particularly clear. And that's too bad, given that the filmmaker appears to have had plenty of good material and resources to work with here, including a cast of players who turn in some of their best-ever on-screen performances, the dreadful script that they've been handed notwithstanding. For what it's worth, the result is a major disappointment, one that exceeds the negative impressions it has already left on so many movie lovers who expect more from a talent like this.

It's an accidental draft dodger drama between Virginia and Montreal in the late 1960s and 2023. Leo Fife (Jacob Elordi/Richard Gere) is a famous left-wing documentary filmmaker in Canada dying of cancer in 2023. Leo allows two former students, Malcolm (Michael Imperioli) and Diana (Victoria Hill), to interview him for a CBC documentary about his life. However, he insists his wife, Emma (Uma Thurman), also a former student, be present throughout the filming.

We soon learn the myth about Leo's past as an anti-Vietnam War resister and free-spirit traveler to Cuba varied from Leo's present (real?) truth. Leo is somewhat confused, but the story he tells is of a shallow, directionless life that caused much pain to others, including two former wives, Amy (Penelope Mitchell) and Alicia (Kristine Froseth), and son Cornel (Zach Shaffer). We learn Leo's flight to Canada did not match the myth.

"Oh, Canada" is a strange film in many ways, but it tells an engaging story about the myths we all allow to be made about ourselves. Paul Schrader's use of several actors in multiple roles is confusing and unnecessary, but Richard Gere does a great job struggling to tell his truth to the woman with whom he's spent 30 years. Uma Thurman is good in portraying Emma as initially resisting Leo's truthtelling but moving towards quiet acceptance.

"Oh, Canada" is not about dodging the Vietnam War; it's instead a drama about coming to terms with one's own myths.

I watched this at Cannes, at the film's premiere.

OH, CANADA is a highly original film by one of the masters of cinema, a real work of art. The film is beautifully made with a strong visual look. It features beautiful cinematography and great production design. The acting is strong, especially Richard Gere who plays the protagonist. He gives a terrific and memorable performance in the vein of Jack Nicholson in FIVE EASY PIECES- a complicated, not always likable but compelling character.

It may not be everyone's cup of tea but I think it is one of Paul Schrader's greatest achievements, and a gift to cinema lovers. Recommended.

At best, this appears to be a case of Paul Schrader reading a novel and getting so impressed by it that he leapt straight into adapting the parts he seemingly considered most relatable, and somewhere along the way, he appears to have forgotten most of his audience would not have read that novel and so be lost when it comes to what he considers "obvious". At worst...well, consider that a director who just two years ago claimed "woke Oscars mean less each year" had now made a film where the moral center of its universe is a pillar of 1960s medium enterprise capitalism, and we are effectively told outright the main character's life had been a failure ever since he abandoned his chance to succeed in his footsteps and pursued filmmaking instead. Quite a coincidence, don't you think?

To clarify, I am fine with the premise that the main character is a jerk. Lots of great fiction features a badly (at times overwhelmingly) flawed protagonist - but to be great or at least good, it needs to be interesting! "Leonard" here is shown to be unsympathetic so early and so decisively, the narrative then proceeds to simply compound the point we already know, and not in captivating ways either. Perhaps the novel was more careful about building Leonard Fife up first so that knocking him down would actually be dramatic but Schrader neglected it; perhaps, he assumed viewers would associate the main character with himself (some reviewers certainly appear to have made that connection, even I very much doubt it) and thus project the films Schrader directed IRL onto him. However, it is just as possible this is simply how Schrader thought the story ought to be, with no other caveats.

Even worse is that the film is actively hostile to not just him as a person, but also to his work and seemingly the entire field of documentary filmmaking. A talented artist being an awful person is a frequent, completely believable story - but here, he effectively stumbles into success. Even after his first lucky break, he is never shown doing anything which requires skill (other than perhaps being able to quote Sontag) - and yet, he is feted as an icon by the Canadian society as a whole and by his colleagues. The unmistakable implication is that the other documentarians work even less than he did, and the effete Canadian society is unable to tell a real talent from a fraud. Considering that Schrader has little connection to Canada and the only thing he ever made which can charitably be called a documentary is a 5m short about his painting, it's hard to avoid viewing this as a reflection of personal beliefs.

Funnily enough, the strongest parts of the film all involve what would ordinarily be a mere framing device. The film would unironically be better if it never left that one house in the present day, if it was just Richard Gere rambling on aloud and in his internal monologue while Uma Thurman is trying in vain to hold him back and we never got to see a single flashback play out on the screen.